


Forgiven

by ThoseDaysThatWill



Category: Men's Hockey RPF
Genre: M/M, Vancouver Canucks, overuse of parentheticals, there's angst but it's also so very sappy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-01
Updated: 2019-05-01
Packaged: 2020-02-10 20:03:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,311
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18667420
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThoseDaysThatWill/pseuds/ThoseDaysThatWill
Summary: This time, Brock had no idea why he was mad, so he couldn’t figure out how to get him to break the silence.





	Forgiven

**Author's Note:**

> This was requested by a lovely anon. The prompt was "You could have died" for Brock and Elias.
> 
> [This](http://i65.tinypic.com/bhi4h.jpg) was my inspiration for the piece. It's set sometime during the 2019 offseason, in Minnesota.

Elias hadn’t said a word in an hour. Not that Brock was wearing a watch (he wasn’t wearing anything but a pair of swim trunks), but it _felt_ like an hour. Of course, when Elias got it in his mind to put that brick wall up, ten minutes _felt_ like an hour. He didn’t get that wall very often (Elias really was _not_ high maintenance, no matter how he might come across), but Brock remembered each and every time. The last time was when Elias thought he was playing injured and couldn’t talk him into missing a game. (He _was_ injured, but they _needed_ him.) He only broke the silence _then_ to tell him he was right about how playing injured just made it worse. And he _was_ right.

 _This_ time, Brock had no idea why he was mad, so he couldn’t figure out how to get him to break the silence. The day had started well enough. It had been too long ( _weeks!_ ) since he’d woken up beside Elias, and it was so nice to find him burrowed in his side that morning. Elias might have started the night on his side of the bed ( _sometimes_ ), but he always woke up curled right into Brock, as if looking for warmth. (That was how he explained it the first time, that he was cold.) He laid in bed, letting Elias sleep late (well, late for him anyway), and just watched him. (Not in a creepy way, but in a he-can’t-believe-how-in-love-he-is way.)

By the time they actually got out of bed, it was later than he’d usually take the boat out, but the weather was too nice not to. Plenty of sunscreen (he didn’t understand how they could keep the stuff on the shelves in Sweden), Coola, some take-out lunch, and they were in the middle of the lake. Somehow, making love on the open water was even _better_ than in their bed (he didn’t know it _got_ better), and laying out in the sun after felt _perfect_. Eventually, Elias fell asleep, but the sun (among other things) gave Brock too much energy to be still for long. He draped a towel over as much of Elias as he could cover (he had never seen anyone go from pale to burnt as fast as him) and found where his trunks had landed. Getting just that much dressed, he jumped off the back of the boat.

He’d done it a million times growing up. The boat wasn’t _moving,_ and he was an exceptionally strong swimmer. The water was cool and felt fantastic against his close-to-burnt skin. The sun liked him a little more than it liked Elias, but not _so much_ that he was immune to the need to constantly reapply sunscreen. He swam a little ways out from the boat, taking a minute to just relax and float. It was about then that Coola discovered he was missing, and started to bark. _Loudly_. At the sound, Brock started swimming back for the boat. He heard his name being called but he didn’t stop to reply. He was only a minute away. By the time he hoisted himself back up onto the boat, Elias was glaring at him.

Brock gave him a confused look, “What? I was just swimming. I didn’t want to wake you up.”

Elias didn’t respond, but instead sat down and pulled Coola close, petting his head to calm him. He had stopped barking the moment Brock emerged from the water, and curled up with Elias now, enjoying the attention.

“Are you mad?” Brock just stared at him, “Because… I went swimming?”

Elias glanced up at him through the hair falling in his eyes but said nothing. After a few seconds, he put his attention back on the dog.

Brock sighed, “Okay, I guess that means mad. How about _why_ now?” He moved to sit next to him, but that just earned him another glare, so he stopped. He took a seat on the bench instead but turned to face him. When he got no response, he tried again, “Can I get a _hint_ at why you’d be mad about me swimming?”

And so it went, for some extremely long (by Brock’s standards—it wasn’t actually an hour) amount of time. He supposed he could have brought the boat back in and let him be quiet on his own, but he didn’t. Eventually, he figured, Elias would have to say _something_ and keeping him on the boat seemed the best way to ensure that. Even if he just asked him to bring them back in, that would be _something_. The silence was driving him crazy. Elias didn’t talk _a lot_ , but he did talk _some_ and that was a hell of a lot more than _nothing_. Nothing was torture.

“I can’t take this anymore. I am going to go _insane_ if you don’t _talk_ to me.” He finally snapped. (Snapped was also relative, he didn’t actually raise his voice, Elias _hated_ being yelled at in anger, and he knew that.)

Elias looked at him for a moment, and then sighed. His voice was very soft, “You could have _died_.”

Brock blinked for a few seconds, while those words actually processed, “ _What?_ ”

“I woke up and you were just… _gone_.” He looked down at his hands, letting his hair fall like a curtain to hide his face.

Brock moved to kneel down in front of where he was sitting, “Look at me.”

Elias bit his lip, but lifted his head enough that he could meet his eyes.

Brock reached up to brush his hair back, “I scared you?”

Elias closed his eyes, but nodded just a little. The look on his face knotted Brock’s stomach up. Of course, in his own head, it was silly to think anything could happen to him out there. He wasn’t that far from the boat and he knew the lake like the back of his hand. He wouldn’t have jumped in anywhere he couldn’t handle himself. But Elias didn’t _know_ any of that. To him, the lake might as well have been on Mars for as well as he knew the terrain. He _should_ have thought of that. The idea that he had caused Elias to panic made him sick.

He reached up to stroke his cheek and was glad to feel him tip his head towards his hand. “I’m so _sorry_.” He couldn’t have sounded more sincere if he tried. He _was_ sincere.

Elias opened his eyes and met his. If his eyes were a little wet, they both pretended like they didn’t notice. “Don’t do it again.”

“I _promise_.” He moved to sit next to him, still cupping his cheek, “Do you forgive me?”

Elias nodded, “ _This_ time.” The very corners of his lips curled into the start of a smile, “But if you do that again, I won’t. And I will _let_ you go insane with quiet.”

Brock gave him a wry smile, “You knew exactly how well that would work.” It wasn’t a question. Elias knew how to please him, and it was hardly surprising he knew how to torture him too.

“I know _everything_ about you.” Elias reminded him. Maybe that wasn’t _exactly_ true, but that didn’t matter. He knew the important things. “Like right now, I know you want to kiss me.”

Brock grinned, “Hell yeah, I do.” He slid his hand to the back of his neck, pulling him in to kiss him deeply. If the words weren’t enough of an apology, the kiss _was_. He didn’t know how to do anything less that fully, so every time they kissed there was an overload of emotions. He loved him so fully and so passionately, he couldn’t help but show him. And for his part, Elias returned every bit of it. That kind of emotions could forgive _a lot_.


End file.
